


Ripping

by RHBerry



Category: Original Work
Genre: Blood and Gore, Body Horror, Disturbing Themes, Horror, Short One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-07
Updated: 2020-03-07
Packaged: 2021-02-28 23:21:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23045449
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RHBerry/pseuds/RHBerry
Summary: Just another day.
Kudos: 4





	Ripping

Gripping, unforgiving paralysis. The dim light of encroaching dawn coloured her ceiling grey, eerie dancing shadows cast by the tree outside her window. It was just another morning, she told herself. Just another day.

Her heart thrummed up against her chest and in her throat. Far from abating her panic, the reminder just made her feel worse. Exhaustion dragged her eyelids back down, warring with fear and unwillingness to do what had to be done.

Putting it off wouldn't make it any easier. A hot lump of acid bit out the inside of her esophagus, and she thought she might choke on vomit if she dared to keep lying in bed.

Breathe. One, two, steady. Swallow.

One limb at a time. Head, first.

She began to strain against the weight of immobility, pressing her forehead up against the thick web of tissue encircling her skull. For all the softness of her own skin, it was an unforgiving prison. Hard to break through with nothing but determination, which was waning by the minute.

She didn't want to do this. She'd have done anything not to have to do this.

The tender membrane of her eyes throbbed as she pressed herself flush to the flesh. All the force was coming from her shoulders, neck craning and head tilting forward as far as she could make it go. Her mattress did not yield, making it a little easier to push off of.

Then, the first split. A sharp scream echoed against her tight lips.

She'd torn through her face. The first barrier. Raw muscle peeled out of the skin she was trying to abandon, stinging in fierce agony. Blood oozed from the new wound, slipping hot down the patches of tissue still attached to her cheekbones. The cartilage in her nose might have snapped from the pressure she'd put on it, caving in against malleable bone.

It would be easier from here, she lied to no one. Torso.

Her wild pulse was the point she focused on. Dragging herself through the tension, her cries came unbidden from her gaping jaw, incoherent lyrics accompanying a wet, sloppy song. Her ribcage expanded, collapsed, expanded again, bludgeoning their way through fatty breasts. Her hips craned up, meeting the surface of her skin and worming their way through fissures.

Blood soaked through the blankets and spread. Unpleasantly warm, then sickeningly cold. Pain was hot, but the air on her exposed nerves was cold.

Knees. The tendons snapped, seared, leaving her kneecaps dangling from threads of oozing, undulating pink.

Her arms, now, and then the rest of her legs. If she could just get it over with quickly, maybe it wouldn't be so bad – she couldn't see the gore, anymore, and that would have given her some modicum of comfort if the reason for her blindness wasn't oozing, gelatinous, out of her eye sockets.

Wrenching her fragile finger bones out of the stubborn shell was the worst part. They inevitably pinched and pulled, knuckles stretched to the snapping point. Her bitten-down nails stripped themselves off first, and were followed by gnarled fingertips. There was nothing she could do to salvage the scraps of bone.

Released at last, what was left of her rang with bright red pain. Her intestines pooled out of her skeletal form, smacking the laminate floor. Unseeing, her broken hands groped to keep what she could inside.

Then she started picking up the shredded suit of skin, and pasted it over her drying bones.

It took hours to patch together something that resembled a normal human girl. Dragging herself unsteadily to her washroom mirror, she streaked blackish crimson over the stained bath mat and dripped on the fake marble counter. There were visible lines seeping through the patchwork of her skin.

Clawing open the clasp of her make-up kit, she prised it open and removed the thick creams and powders she used to fill in the cracks. She smoothed out the plane of her face like filling in drywall with caulk, vision foggy and swimming throughout the process. Her eyes were impossible to really repair. She just did what she could.

There was so much blood all over her apartment. She didn't have the energy, or the time, to clean it up.

She dressed, and covered as much of her slipshod body as she could. Long sleeves, long skirt. The clothing felt scratchy, like it had been stitched with barbed wire thread. That feeling would go away over the course of the day, as she stopped registering pain and went numb.

The alarm clock by her bed went off, cueing an end to her dwelling. She shut off the blaring radio and went to her front door, taking the keys from their little peg by the coat rack and locking it behind her.

Just another morning, she told herself. Just another day.


End file.
